This is, of course, nothing new in the highly competitive mobile devices industry. In fact, Samsung has been guilty of doing the same to its idol competitor.

Now, what did Apple do or say to Samsung?

Nothing.

That’s right – zip, zilch, zero… nada.

Apple said nothing; instead, it maintained the high road and didn’t kick its competitor while they were down (or attempt to take revenge for the many trolling incidences in the past). After all, the issue was a serious one – explosions are no small things and any injury to a consumer is one too many. What if a device had exploded in the hands of a child?

While investigations into the incident are ongoing, the news cycle has, well, exploded. Reading through the coverage, however, there isn’t much cynicism directed towards Apple (although, there’s plenty to go around in mobile devices sector especially in regards to one brand copying another).

Can you imagine how the news cycle and public backlash might be like if Apple had trolled Samsung during the exploding Note 7 fiasco, though?

The news that the world’s last manufacturer of Videocassette Recorders (“VCR”) will manufacture its last VCR has gone around the world. 40 years after the first VHS video cassette recorder was manufactured, Japanese consumer electronics company Funai Electric – the last known company making the devices – is ceasing production of its VCR products. The company cited declining sales and difficulty in obtaining the necessary parts as reasons to cease production. At its peak, the company sold 15 million VCRs per year, which has since dwindled down to 750,000 units in 2015 (Frankly, still an astonishing number! Who knew that three-quarters of a million people still bought brand new VCRs?!).

The news caught my attention for a couple of reasons.

Recorded Nostalgia

First of all, I was hit by a wave of nostalgia. When I was growing up, we had limited screen time (television, not tablet). My mother would record our TV shows during the week and we’d watch them during the weekend; after homework and revision, of course. Or that time when my friends discussed the first time they saw what was on the tapes dad had hidden away. 😉

I also remembered the “accessories” industry that sprouted around the VCR and VHS tapes. Who didn’t have some sort of VHS tape rewinder placed near their TV stand?

Remember these?!

Fast Forward To The End

Secondly, I was impacted by the fact that obsolescence has claimed yet another victim. Very specifically, it reminded me about the following clip from the movie, Other People’s Money, starring Danny Devito.

The bit when “Larry the Liquidator”, talked about obsolescence with the example of “the last company around […] that made the best goddamn buggy whip you ever saw” is especially powerful for me.

This company is dead.

I didn’t kill it. Don’t blame me.

It was dead when I got here. […]

You know why?

Fiber optics. New technologies. Obsolescence.

We’re dead, all right. We’re just not broke.

And do you know the surest way to go broke?

Keep getting an increasing share of a shrinking market. Down the tubes. Slow but sure.

You know, at one time there must have been dozens of companies making buggy whips. And I’ll bet the last company around was the one that made the best goddamn buggy whip you ever saw.

The app icons – self-described as their “most important touch points” – also elicited a universal, “Huh?!” Uber tried to explain them:

Rider app icon

(Via Uber)

01. The Bit – At the center of our app icons is the Bit—the symbol of our technology.

02. Product shape – Surrounding the Bit is a shape that denotes the product and represents the atoms moved by our technology. For the rider app, this shape is a circle.

03. Grid line – To convey the rider story of a trip in progress or the arrival at a destination, a single line connects the Bit with the shape around it.

04. Patterns and colors – Behind the other components is a canvas of color and pattern, another representation of the physical world that symbolizes the cities and people we serve.

Partner app icon

(Via Uber)

01. The Bit – At the center of our app icons is the Bit—the symbol of our technology.

02. Product shape – The shape containing the Bit in our partner app icon is a hexagon, which imparts familiarity with a nod to the previous version of the icon.

03. Grid lines – With the partner app, 2 lines meet at the Bit to imply the connection between riders and drivers. The lines also divide the hexagon into halves: one represents our riders and the other, our partners.

04. Patterns and colors – Behind the other components is a canvas of color and pattern, another representation of the physical world that symbolizes the cities and people we serve.

Other elements in their rebranding involved their logotype, which was redesigned to denote “quality and elegance, while the combination of straight and curved lines convey both confidence and approachability”, as well as a 65 local color palettes and patterns, representing countries in which Uber operates and are “authentic expressions of the real world’s diversity.”

I do appreciate their visual design challenge as a “glocal” (global-local) brand, though. I think they were initially on the right track:

We want people around the world to feel like Uber was born in their city, so a conventional brand system simply won’t work. You can’t have the same look and feel in Chengdu as you do in Charleston and expect to be embraced by both cultures. At the same time, building a globally recognizable brand requires common elements people can associate with you.

Another challenge our brand faces is balancing the need to cement a strong unified vision while supporting the unbridled hustle of local teams distributed across 68 countries—both key factors in our rapid growth. Our new identity system was designed specifically to solve for this complexity.

The new Uber brand system is made up of primary and secondary components that tell the story of technology moving the physical world. Some create consistency across touchpoints for building brand recognition, while others ensure the flexibility to serve local markets. They can be combined in a seemingly endless array, allowing our brand to adapt for the road ahead.

Despite all the rationale behind the brand concept, the strategy is meaningless if the execution falls flat.

While a brand is not just a logo – it certainly is the “first impression” of the brand. Good brand logos serve as both a sign and a signifier. In semiotics, a sign or a symbol is the physical representation of the idea that lies behind it… which is what is signified by the sign.

A good logo provides the pleasure of recognition and the promise of meaning.

Uber’s new logo design fails on both fronts, IMHO. It neither provides that “pleasure of recognition” nor “the promise of meaning.” As it is, the logo (and especially the app icon) is not immediately recognized as “Uber” (especially when compared to their previous white “U” against the black background). This is compounded by the fact that there are two separate identities for drivers and riders; and even more so with the multiple palettes and colors for the markets they operate in.